Month: June 2016

So: Prime Minister David Cameron avoided blurting out any notification under Article 50 at yesterday’s European Council meeting. This daft attempt yesterday by the European Parliament to bounce the UK into making such a notification failed: 5. Warns that in order to prevent damaging uncertainty for everyone and to protect the Union’s integrity, the notification stipulated in … Read more

Law and politics are separate things, and they do not often overlap. It is rare that politics is driven, or even shaped, by legal process or any legal issue. But it does happen sometimes, and it is happening in the United Kingdom at the moment. The legal issue is about a provision in a European … Read more

“Is there any other point to which you would wish to draw my attention?” “To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.” “The dog did nothing in the night-time.” “That was the curious incident,” remarked Sherlock Holmes. – The Adventure of Silver Blaze * On Thursday 23rd June 2016 there was a historic … Read more

1. The EU referendum result, by itself, has no legal impact. It was an advisory not a mandatory referendum. (See my FT post here.) 2. All UK law – including that drawn from the EU – remains in place today just as it was yesterday. Nothing in yesterday’s result affects the applicability or enforceability of any … Read more

Here is my modest proposal for a short Act of Parliament for banning referendums. You will see how it would make such a ban irreversible. Referendum Banning Act 2016 1. The holding of a referendum is hereby prohibited. 2. This Act can only be repealed by a referendum. – That should do the trick, shouldn’t … Read more

There are two problems with the current EU referendum. Why this referendum was a bad idea The first problem comes from there never having been a need – in an objective sense – for this EU referendum. By “objective” I mean that there was no external reason – such as a new EU treaty or similar proposal … Read more